Dear community,

We are the first cohort of WEL+, an embodied leadership program that is an offering of Universal Partnership. Our cohort consists of leaders from many national and local organizations based in New York, Philadelphia, Wisconsin, and Jackson, MS.

Our cohort member from Jackson invited us to experience embodied leadership by being grounded in the Deep South, her chosen home. She bore witness to the legacies and power of the people and place. Its a loving and relational invitation for those of us who do change work nationally and in the north east to sharpen our analysis of power by being in a deep southern city like Jackson. The love and the invitation to stretch and grow resonated with us and we committed to making a trip in October 2024.

We are planning 3 day cultural immersion in Jackson, MS. None of us have been in Jackson before. In order to respectfully and intentionally navigate Jackson, we are committed to doing the following pre immersion work. 1) political orientation by community historians 2) reading, viewing and listening to cultural, economic, political and social legacies.

In Jackson, we will go through a facilitated civil rights tour, visit with community leaders who are knowledge and cultural producers across generations, ground ourselves in place, and also do our day long embodied leadership session.

The key outcomes we are hoping for are deepening our relationships to each other as cohorts, build equitable relationships with community, sharpen our analysis of power, and fortify our clarity of what Jackson and MS have been for the last 200 years.

We are seeking support to help our travel, accommodation and community engagement resourcing.

We hope in the future, we are able to support you on a similar journey.

WEL+ Jackson MS

Support our cohort to learn and grow in the Black & Southern Radical Traditions

Team Members